


i'm thinking: this is where we live

by comosum



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Albus Dumbledore Bashing, Character Study, M/M, Miscommunication, Mutual Pining, POV Remus Lupin, Post-Hogwarts, Second War with Voldemort, Sharing a Bed, The Order, Welsh Remus Lupin, no beta we die like men
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-13
Updated: 2020-07-13
Packaged: 2021-03-04 22:35:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,099
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25243996
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/comosum/pseuds/comosum
Summary: This was something they didn’t talk about. They never had.Somewhere along the line, they stumbled into something more than friendship, but never enough that either thought it warranted a conversation. It had gone far past a time suitable for them to discuss these instances that unfolded out between them; a fruit halved and shared.(Or, two men in love. In the middle of a war, at the end of the world.)
Relationships: Sirius Black/Remus Lupin
Comments: 5
Kudos: 65





	i'm thinking: this is where we live

**Author's Note:**

> DISCLAIMER: i started this before JK Rowling opened her transphobic and generally bigoted mouth. i would like to clarify that as a nb lesbian i have never and will never agree with anything she has said. 
> 
> also my knowledge of canon is way off base as i've only read the books once when i was 10 and rely on fanon to fuel my opinions. hopefully this doesn't take away from the enjoyment!
> 
> title from snow and dirty rain by richard siken

When Remus left to make his way back to the house, it was growing dark. It was the quiet kind, that loomed and stood still. Front rooms seemed to glow as he passed, coy and sentimental. The wind whispered. Buildings on both sides of the street leaned towards him curiously, and he let them look at him, like a candle burning on both ends. 

It had been a long day. He’d heaved himself around the city in his smart shoes, waterlogged and downtrodden, flitting between interviews and cafes. He knew that he was overqualified for all of the jobs he sought out, and he also knew he likely wouldn’t get a call back from any. It was fine. Nothing he wasn’t used to. 

He knew that it wasn’t what he was supposed to be doing. But the line between  _ supposed  _ and  _ doing  _ was growing fainter these days, and so was his ability to care. He did what he could to keep afloat, like everyone else.

After the night had dragged into a lifetime, his roaming took him to his dearest slither of London. He turned into Grimmauld Place, eyeing number twelve as he did so. The burning beacon of what he loved and loathed. His chapel, his hymnbook, his headstone. His sermon. His altar. His prayer cushion beneath his pew. 

He opened the door, and set about his worship. 

\--

Muddy November had left Sirius and Remus to their own devices. Mostly the days were spent meandering from room to room, jumping at every owl or floo call. Everything was a waiting game these days. Sirius was restless. Remus was taking long walks down to the quayside. 

Since being cooped up, he had been slowly encountering more of his own worries, most of which were hardly even rooted in the war. He had yet to find the nerve to say them out loud. Something about how he wasn’t sure how long his body was built to last for. Something about the fact he was almost fully grey now. Something about how he didn’t know how many more times his bones could bend, break and still be able to fuse themselves back together.

Something about how he wished he had someone to ask. Something about how guilty his wishes made him. 

He made his way through the hall, toeing off his shoes and shrugging out of his raincoat as he did so. The way the light fell in the entrance of Grimmauld Place always made him uneasy, reminiscent of the coloured windows in the church back in ‘72, up on the hill in the craggy mists of North Wales. Glass stained with the muggy wants of something more. 

The rain had set a coldness into his core, which put the canine in him on edge. With an ear out for the potterings of Sirius, he ducked through the doorway to the kitchen.

He tucked a stool under his arm and set it in front of the Aga, before sitting down heavily. It was his favourite stool, with a ledge bridging the three legs which he perched his socked feet onto, and initials carved into its underside. He liked to be able to follow the lines of it at dinnertime, the surety of it comforting to his calloused touch.  _ S.O.B.  _ An action, and a promise. But most of all, a name. 

Bowing his head and resting it on his kneecaps, he sighed as the warmth eased itself into his skin. 

Soon, Sirius’ wanderings took him to the vicinity of Remus. He listened as Sirius opened the cupboard and set two mugs on the counter. As he charmed the kettle to life. As he opened the tin where they kept teabags, and then the one they kept instant coffee, and paused in question. Remus felt his gaze on him.

“Coffee,” he answered, shoulders still sagging, eyes still closed. “Thanks.”

The soft  _ tssh  _ of coffee granules hitting the bottom of a mug. The soft  _ put  _ of a tea bag hitting another. And then:

“Long day?” 

Remus stretched out from his woodlouse imitation and cracked his back. Opened his eyes. Spoke through a yawn. 

“It was fine.” 

“Not what I asked.”

Sirius was to the left of him, turned slightly away, as he lifted the kettle off the hob. His hair was getting long; he’d tugged half of it up into a bun. Remus leaned back against the counter and admired the line of his back. 

“It was busy,” he smiled at the back of his head. “I think they went well. Might get some offers.”

Sirius hummed as he stirred some sugar into Remus’ mug and pressed it into his hand.

“How was  _ your  _ day?” He offered, cradling the coffee to his chest. Sirius grabbed his tea and rested his back against the cupboard, sipping it. He shrugged. 

Remus reached his hand out and took Sirius’. 

“Went by that teashop you talked about,” he said. “They had some of the fancy Earl Grey you like. Thought of you.” 

Sirius rubbed circles into the back of his knuckles. 

He smiled. “You trying to buy my affection, Moony?” 

“Don’t need to,” he answered. “It’s in my coat pocket. I’ll go get it.”

He left the kitchen with a squeeze to Sirius’ hand. 

“You need to stop spending our muggle money on daft things, Moony.” Sirius’ voice followed him as he rifled in his coat pocket, retrieving the little tin with a wry grin of triumph.

He returned to the kitchen, met Sirius’ dry look and set the tin down by the others on the counter. It was purple. For all Remus liked red, he welcomed colours that didn’t hold allegiances. 

“First of all,” he replied, “this was  _ my  _ muggle money. Second of all, it’s not a daft thing if it’s for you.”

Sirius raised an eyebrow. 

“Is that supposed to make me melt, or something?”

“I don’t know,” Remus said. “It’s just the truth. Why? Did it make you melt?”

“Or something.” 

Despite his light words, Remus could still see there was a little tightness around Sirius’ periphery. It made him uneasy, Remus knew, having to worry about money. Sirius didn’t like being dependent on Albus. He couldn’t be blamed. For all Remus had gotten used to short receipts, war made them shorter. When they were constantly waiting on deliveries from someone in the Order, it sometimes felt like they were living hand to mouth. 

“It’s okay, love. It didn’t cost much. It’s just tea, even if it is your favourite.”

Sirius smiled, soft.

“Okay.”

Remus stood.

“I’m just going to have a quick bath and get changed. My clothes are still wet.”

He set his coffee down, bent his neck to kiss Sirius on the cheek, and headed upstairs. 

\--

This was something they didn’t talk about. They never had. 

Somewhere along the line they stumbled into something more than friendship, but never enough that either thought it warranted a conversation. It had gone far past a time suitable for them to discuss these instances that unfolded out between them; a fruit halved and shared.

And, okay. Maybe it was more than that. Maybe Remus knew that Sirius was one for snap decisions. Maybe Remus was wary of pushing Sirius into confronting what they had made for themselves. What they had allowed to settle in the old beams of Grimmauld. 

(And before that, Remus’ withering flat in Cardiff. And before that, their two-bedroom in a corner of Camden. And before that, a dorm room in Scotland. And before that, wherever people exist before they’re born. What lived between them now lived between them then, little pockets of light in the valley of black.)

Which is to say, Remus knew Sirius inside out. Which is to say, Remus knew that Sirius loved him. Which is to say, Remus knew he loved Sirius.

Which is to say, though this was all true, Remus still wasn’t sure what the fallout would look like if he pushed the issue. 

So they didn’t talk about it between them. Didn’t pull up the carpet and polish the floorboards underneath. 

But that isn’t to say that Remus hadn’t voiced it before. 

At seventeen, Remus and James had found themselves alone at their usual table in The Three Broomsticks. It was December, and the snow had come quick in the morning. Remus remembered the snowflakes that had settled in James’ hair quickly melted in the presence of a fireplace, and had transformed his usually jovial curls into a drooping mop that kept having to be swept out of the way of his glasses. 

Anyway, it was there, over some warmed butterbeers, that James burnt the bridge.

“Hey, Moony…” James had said, and  _ this  _ was when Remus had seen the future laid out in front of him; a prophecy in James Potter’s open palm. James had adopted the tone of voice he used when he was trying to be sly, and Remus knew that there was only one thing that James would want to be sly about. 

Well,  _ ‘thing’  _ was maybe the wrong word to illustrate all that Sirius encompassed. Perhaps  _ ‘natural disaster’  _ would be more fitting. Or  _ ‘cultural movement’ _ .

“I need to talk to you about something,” he said, nudging his glasses up his nose with his ring finger, “but I need you to know that I’m only speaking from the all goodness in my heart.”

“I honestly don’t believe that anything you say comes from anywhere else.” Remus had replied truthfully. 

“Well,” he had said, mollified. “It’s about Sirius.”

“I figured,” Remus said; again, a truth. With James, it was difficult to lie.

James had stretched, and rested his elbows on the back of his chair, almost baring his neck. 

Remus had often wondered if they all acted a little less human, the four of them, than the majority of people they walked among. James’ body language was sometimes so animalistic, puffing up his chest protectively in a fight or bowing his head in submission when he apologised, that it was comical. But at that moment it put Remus at ease. The conversation would be nothing to worry about. 

“You’re both my brothers, you know that,” he started. “But I noticed. You and Pads… you two aren’t like brothers, are you?”

The black hole opened, and the choirs started singing, but Remus found he didn’t mind. 

“No,” he confessed. “But we haven’t talked about it.”

“No,” James agreed. “But…” he started again, leaning further back on his chair’s hindlegs. “You both  _ know _ . I can tell.”

James was always funny like that. Impossibly tuned in with his friends, almost uncharacteristically observant. Sirius always said for all the time he spent trying to act aloof, it was criminal how much he actually noticed about them all.

There was nothing else for it.

“Yeah,” Remus cleared his throat. “Yeah.”

And then the rest of them came in from the cold. 

Lily, Marlene, Dorcas, Mary, Frank, Alice and Peter. 

And, of course, Sirius. 

He took the seat next to Remus as a few of the others headed to the bar, and knocked their knees together under the table. 

As their friends clattered about them, James caught Remus’ eye over the commotion, and raised a glass. It hadn’t escaped his notice that Sirius and Lily had respectively greeted Remus and James in the same way.

“To what are we drinking, Prongs?” Sirius asked, a radio, tuned into his brother.

“The happy couple,” James replied. Lily laughed warmly at his side and kissed his cheek, while the table echoed his sentiment, eager as a Greek chorus and just as misguided. 

In the midst of the cacophony, James leaned into her, and winked at Remus. 

Remus raised his glass, nodded, winked back, and drank.

And just like that, his fate was sealed. 

\--

In fresh clothes, Remus thudded down the stairs to return to his coffee. 

It was getting on nine, and Sirius had taken his place by the stove, stirring something in a stew pot. It was a dark green, and Remus was fairly sure it was from Le Creuset. Who knows when Sirius had made time to buy a muggle pot that was worth its weight in gold. There was a line they had to draw between things they could talk about without arguing, and Remus saw it now. 

Sirius looked up at the sound of Remus taking a gulp of his coffee, and when he saw him with the waylaid mug halfway from his mouth, he wrinkled his nose.

“You’re disgusting,” he said.

“Waste not want not.”

“It would cost literally nothing for you to heat it up.”

Remus shrugged.

“I like it when it’s cold.”

Sirius spoke to the ceiling. 

“Every single day you revolt me in new ways. It’s genuinely incredible, after this many years.” He nodded towards a letter on the side. “That came while you were in the bath.” 

“What is it?”

“I dunno. Haven’t opened it yet, it’s addressed to both of us.”

He watched as Sirius became impressively focused on whatever was over the stove. Noticing the tense line of his shoulders, he asked:

“Want me to open it?”

“Please,” came the grateful reply, tension leaking out of him and into the room. 

Remus picked up the letter and took it to the table, settling in a chair that faced the oven so that he could watch Sirius. 

He ripped the seal of the envelope, eyes on Sirius as he did so. Once it was open, he skimmed it, skipping to the end. He let out a breath he didn’t realise he was holding. 

“It’s from Harry,” he said, looking up at Sirius.

“What’s he say?”

“Dunno, didn’t get that far” he got out of his chair and went to the stove, taking the stilled spoon from Sirius’ hand. “Look, we’ll swap. You can read it, Pads.”

“Thanks.” 

Sirius had been stirring some huge vat of pasta which Remus looked down upon in grateful anticipation. 

Sirius read Harry’s letter outloud, and when he finished he said, in summation:

“Just school stuff, worried about exams and telling us about his friends, basically.”

“Thank Merlin,” Remus replied. 

“At least we know his owl, now. A snowy,” He said this last part as an aside, looking up at Remus from the letter in his hands, “like the one Frank had in sixth year.”

“Ah,” Remus grinned. “Celestina Warbeak. What a bird.”

“You have selective memory, Moony,” Sirius grumbled. “That owl was evil. Tried to peck my eyes out on multiple occasions.”

“Sounds more like a you-problem, if you ask me,” Remus grabbed his wand to accio two bowls over to the counter to ladle full of pasta.

“Can’t believe you’d take the side of a bird over me.”

Remus took the bowls down to the table, setting one in front of Sirius before sitting opposite. 

“Can’t believe you’d expect me not to.”

“Have a history of getting with birds, do you? Didn’t think you swung that way.”

“Ha,” Remus said, deadpan. “Someone get the funnyman on tv.”

“So rude,” Sirius replied, kicking Remus’ ankles gently under the table. “Using muggle shit against me. You know I don’t understand what you’re talking about, you horrid man.”

“Dial up internet,” Remus said. “Rotary phones. Solar panels. Escalators.”

Sirius nodded earnestly, playing the part of an avid listener. 

“Mhm, yes, very interesting!”

“Idiot,” Remus smiled fondly. “I’m going to leave you for Arthur Weasley.”

“Oh, but Molly hates me already, Moony!”

“Well, then you’d have something to bond about. Your men leaving you for a tropical getaway in the Bahamas.”

“I see,” Sirius spoke through a mouthful of pasta. “You’re only leaving me for pina coladas and some sun, not our close and dear friend Arthur. Have fun burning to a crisp, thousands of miles away from the Cadbury’s Museum.”

“I’ve never even been to the Cadbury’s Museum, twat. How can you know about the Cadbury’s Museum but still pretend to not understand tv?”

“I’m a man of culture, Moony.” 

“You’re a man of  _ something,  _ that’s for sure.”

“Aw, don’t be sad Moons. Once all this is over I’ll take you out to the Cadbury’s Museum, my treat.”

“I’ll hold you to that.”

“I hope you do! I want to see what all the fuss is about.”

“There’s hardly  _ fuss  _ about it.”

“Well, which one of us has walked the streets of Birmingham as a fugitive dog? There’s clearly not a lot going on there, it was the topic of a worrying number of conversations.”

“I’ll take your word for it.”

Once dinner was over, they magicked the bowls clean, even though Sirius grumbled when he heard the charm Remus used. He was an avid believer in cleaning by hand, a curious characteristic of a man that Remus struggled to remember ever doing the washing up out of his own volition. 

After everything was in order, Sirius looked at Remus and said:

“Right, well. I’m off to bed.”

And he wandered off upstairs to his miserable little bedroom from when he was a teenager, and closed the door. 

  
This was Remus Lupin’s biggest problem.

\--

It wasn’t like it especially mattered in the grand scheme of things, Remus supposed. They had spent an awful lot of their lives spending every waking moment together - it was unsurprising, really, that Sirius would rather spend his sleeping moments alone. 

But Remus was self assured enough to know that he was selfish, and embarrassing as it was, he spent countless nights tossing and turning in bed, wanting desperately to be sleeping next to him.

In 1978, in the warm walls of the first flat they bought together, Remus had had the same problem. 

Back then, Sirius would sleep much less than him. Remus needed the long hours, especially around the full moon. His body would itch to stay awake but if he listened to it, the tiredness that would come the next day hit him twice as hard. 

The fact that remained, however, was that Remus had always been a little bit of a bastard.

He remembered empty days when they were still young, barely out of Hogwarts, Remus with only a few grey hairs and Sirius with none. 

In the evenings, Remus would sit with Sirius as he did Order work on the sofa, ignoring his body. Remus would read a book or work on some cursebreaking into the small hours of the night. These were the days where he was still cautiously optimistic about work, applying for jobs that were right for him and trying his best to be surprised when he was fired within a couple months.

Eventually, he’d grow more and more tired, shoulders drooping and blinks coming slowly until he felt like his body would give out. Then he’d fall asleep right there on the sofa next to Sirius. 

Sometimes he’d sleep fitfully, waking up in small increments to find himself under a blanket, and then alone. But sometimes he would open his eyes between vivid dreams and find that he had fallen asleep with his head on Sirius’ shoulder, or that his body had shifted in sleep to be pressed up against him in one hot line. 

He’d lay awake with his eyes shut, willing his body to be still, for his breaths to come evenly and for him to pass back into sleep. He would notice how Sirius seemed to work carefully to keep excruciatingly still so as not to disturb him. This was a difficult task: they all knew that Remus was a light sleeper from their years at Hogwarts. Sometimes Remus would wonder how his trickery worked so easily if Sirius knew this, but he didn’t want to tempt fate.

Waking up in the mornings always filled Remus with a heavy and irrevocable guilt. He was so awful, so conniving, so twisted. He was the worst of the worst, the dirt on the bottom of everyone’s shoes. How sick was he, to trick his best friend into allowing him to sleep by his side? 

And then would come the waves of deprecation. He got everything he deserved. Of course he would have to  _ trick  _ his friends into providing this comfort; he wasn’t human, he wasn’t  _ meant  _ to have the weight of someone next to him when he slept. Not at night. Not when he was most dangerous. 

Each and everyday after he woke up on the sofa he would tell himself that he wasn’t going to do it again. That he was disgusting and manipulative. 

But then he’d walk into the living room in the evening, and Sirius would be sitting on the sofa, his skin washed soft in the orange light of the lampshade. 

Something would tug in Remus, and he’d make some excuse to sit. Every fucking time. 

And it’d please the wolf. He could feel it settling contentedly whenever he was around Sirius, especially at the times he felt vulnerable. 

Once again, he would wonder how much of him was animal and how much of him was human. When he was a kid he used to comfort himself by saying he was only 3.6% wolf: one night out of 28. 

After he began noticing how the wolf would shift and settle at the sight of Sirius, he wasn’t so sure. 

And though it was years later, though Sirius could have forgotten these moments completely, Remus had the thought, persistent in the back of his head, that Sirius was leaving their shared space early in the evening to avoid him. 

As if, at the first embrace they shared, Sirius had remembered the nights spent stifled by the weight of Remus against him and thought  _ Not this again. I won’t let him do that again.  _

And though, rationally, he could have merely forgotten, Remus knew that to find out the answer he’d have to ask. 

He would never ask. He wasn’t brave enough to know. 

\--

The next morning, Remus was up earlier than usual. He had struggled to sleep last night. He always did when Sirius was asleep in the same building but a different room. Suffice to say he hadn’t been well rested as of late. 

He had dressed silently in the light of a London sunrise, crept into the belly of the house, and read over the morning post. Existing in the walls of Number Twelve when Sirius wasn’t in sight was like stepping into the landscape of a photograph he hadn’t taken. The surroundings peeled themselves away from him, conscious of the intruder. 

Sirius made his way into the kitchen as Remus was pouring boiling water over the tea leaves he had already used once that morning. 

“What the fuck are you doing?” he asked pleasantly. 

“You can use tea leaves twice you know,” Remus replied as he set the kettle back on the stove. “Probably three times, even.”

“Just because you _can,_ it doesn’t mean you _should_ ,” Sirius peered over Remus’ shoulder, going on tiptoes as he did so. “Looks awful.”

Remus turned to him, shifting so they were face to face.

“It just looks like  _ tea _ , Pads. The leaves are wet anyway now.”

“They were wet  _ before  _ this? The fuck do you store your soggy old tea leaves, you terrible old man?” 

“You’re older than me,” Remus stirred his tea with his wand as he leaned back on the counter. “On a dish next to your coffee and shit. You’ve never seen them?”

“Oh, I have. Just wanted to make sure you were the culprit before I blame Kreacher.”

“Kreacher doesn’t even live here anymore. And he can’t reach that high, idiot. He’s like three foot tall.”

“So am I, but I don’t see you exempting me from your complaints about the state of the house.”

“Ah, but I know from experience what a little bugger you are. And thanks for making that joke before I had to, I appreciate it. Very kind of you”

“Actually, it was more out of obligation than kindness. The fruit was hanging so low that its balls were scraping the ground. I was embarrassed for you, Moons. Call yourself a Marauder?”

“I was under the impression that Marauders were funny enough that they don’t have to stoop that low. My humour is nuanced.”

“Interesting that you should say that,” Sirius pondered. “Could you walk me through the nuance of your prolific bat bogey hexes in third year?”

  
“Sure,” Remus lifted his mug from where it had finished brewing on the countertop. “I cast them with a flourish.”

“With a flourish?” Sirius deadpanned.

“The way I flick my wrist,” he pretended to search for the right words, “has a certain… _ je ne sais quoi _ .”

“Oh, I’m sure it does.”

“Tosser,” Remus grinned. 

“So are you, apparently.”

Remus kicked at his ankles in retaliation, before straightening to his full height and checking his watch. 

“Dumbledore has me on some Order shit today,” he said. “Might be back a bit late again.”

“That’s alright,” Sirius smiled tightly.

“No it’s not,” Remus raised his eyebrow. “Idiot. You don’t have to pretend to be fine with it. I’m not happy about it either but he said he’d give us a bonus. I’m gonna get him to pay expenses as well.”

“Oh yeah?” Sirius asked, brightening considerably.

“I’ll splash out at that Indian place you like so much. Still can’t believe your favourite takeaway is in Chelsea, you’re such a posh boy.”

“Hey! Don’t be rude. It’s been my favourite for twenty years, I’m a loyal patron.”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever you say,” Remus finished his tea and glanced at his watch again. “Right I’ve gotta go now. Hold the fort for me?”

“Of course,” Sirius grumbled goodnaturedly. “It’s not like I can fucking go anywhere.”

\--

  
  


To say that Remus did not like doing the Order work that Dumbledore set out for him was an understatement. It wasn’t like he disliked the Order, or disagreed with anything that it stood for. He was obviously willing to bend over backwards to help fight the war in whatever way he could, and had done, countless times in the past

No, the difficulty wasn’t what he had a problem with.

What he had a problem with was the type of work Dumbledore set him up on. 

When an owl came from Dumbledore, there were only two types of work that he would be asked to do. 

The first was menial work. Remus would be treated as a glorified owl, told to look for so and so or deliver a message to various witches and wizards who’d gone underground. He didn’t like this work, because the days were long and frustrating, especially when someone didn’t want to be found - and almost everyone who Dumbledore wanted him to speak to were in hiding, so that accounted for almost all of them. Most of all, it reminded Remus that all he was to Dumbledore was a pawn. He was undervalued. At the dawn of the Order, he’d reminded Dumbledore time and time again that he had been on the brink of starting his Cursebreaking degree before their world went dark, but the fact that he had a skillset useful to what they were working towards seemed unable to register in the old man’s mind. 

The other set of work was what Remus hated the most. This was werewolf work, grunt work. He would be sent out to far reaches of the country, and asked to run with a pack for weeks or months (or, on one occasion, years), infiltrating their ranks and sniffing out their loyalty. Dumbledore seemed unable to understand that the way he spoke about other werewolves couldn’t simply be wiped away with a  _ ‘you’re  _ different  _ from these wolves, Remus. You went to Hogwarts, slept in a regular bed and ate regular food. You’ll have to get into their mindset, understand where they’re coming from’,  _ as if the only thing that allowed Dumbledore to recognise Remus as a human being is an education that  _ he  _ gave him. As if Dumbledore still sees the general werewolf population as unworthy of human rights. 

Today, Dumbledore had sent Remus on a wild goose chase. He had told him that he would put a portkey at the end of his and Sirius’ street, where he’d be taken to another Order member. This mysterious source would then tell Remus more about the person they were to track down.

Though he understood that these kinds of things were occasionally necessary, it did seem to Remus that Dumbledore continued to take the piss year in and year out. Surely he’d proven loyalty enough these past few years.

Remus had reached the end of the street, and was looking around for the portkey, while also trying not to seem overly suspicious. Last week, it had been a crushed up can of Stella under a bench. If he had the energy to talk to Albus Dumbledore anymore than was strictly necessary, he would have long since asked him to stop being so fucking ridiculous. But as it was, he couldn’t be arsed.

After scrounging around for a bit, looking at various objects (a discarded coffee cup, unlikely - Dumbledore didn’t agree with caffeine; a condom wrapper,  _ also  _ unlikely, but would have undeniably made Remus’ day), he decided it must be the knitted hat left on someone’s fencepost. 

Bracing himself, he took a hold of the hat and waited. 

\--

“You alright there, Lupin?”

Remus took a moment before looking up at the voice. He had always hated magical travel; letting his cells be thrown around and rearranged never sat right with him. He always had to wait a few seconds as his dizziness at the bright lights subsided. 

“I’m fine, Shacklebolt,” he smiled wryly, tightening his hands on his knees for a moment. “Just give us a sec, will you?”

“Sure thing, old man.”

“It’s not my fault I’m already greying, you know,” Remus muttered, as he took Kingsley’s hand where he was offering it and pulled himself up. “So. What d’you have to tell me?”

Kinglsey reached into his pocket and pulled out a crumpled bit of paper. Remus pretended not to notice the Lidl logo peeking out from the other side. 

“It’s a basic extraction. Some guy’s got a piece of dark magic at his flat that Albus thinks was supplied by a Death Eater. If we retrieve the object, we should be able to use some detection charms on it to work out who cursed it.” 

“Ah, so a classic errand boy mission then.”

“Essentially,” Kingsley said wryly, setting off across the field they’d landed in. “At least you might  _ actually  _ get to do some cursebreaking this time.” 

“Thank  _ fuck. _ Where are we, anyway?”

“Arsecrack of nowhere,” he turned back to Remus, who was still trying to discreetly catch his breath. “Nah, I’m kidding. Just outside Brighton. He’s got a three-bedroom on the seafront, guy’s loaded. Hurry up, I’ve got a date tonight.” 

Remus stuck his hands in his pockets and began to follow him, the long grass occasionally catching on his trousers. 

“Well, at least one of us is able to maintain a love life in a war,” he commented as he caught up.

“It’s only the first date, so we’ll see. Plus I don’t really think you have anything to worry about that. You’ve lived with Black for 20 odd years, give or take twelve.” He said this last part with a grin shot Remus’ way. 

Remus reckoned only Kingsley could get away with saying shit like that to him. Apparently there’s nothing like brushing shoulders with someone for hours on end as you scour the country for run of the mill evil to get you comfortable with them. 

“Hilarious. You and Sirius should start a duo,” he said before shrugging. “And you know it’s not exactly like  _ that,  _ with us. We don’t talk about it.”

“You should,” Kinglsey said sincerely. “We’re at war, Lupin. Now’s as good a time as any.” 

“I know, I know,” he looked at his shoes. “What’s this guy’s name, anyway?”

“Fergus Harding,” Kinglsey knocked their shoulders together. “Sounds like a twat, right?”

Remus laughed, grateful for the out, and they made their way into the city. 

  
  


\-- 

It turned out that the portkey had actually been more than a few miles off, and it took them a couple hours to get into the beating heart of the town. Brighton was a rumbling city, with students flocking out in winter coats, blanketing the beach even in the middle of November. Remus and Kingsley dipped in and out of a few shops, poking light fun at some muggle contraptions, in an attempt to shake off anyone who might be following them. 

It was times like these, Remus pondered, as he watched his reflection absently in mirrors flanked by driftwood, that he especially missed Sirius. He missed the easy quality of the first years out of Hogwarts, when Sirius had enough money from Alphard to support them as Remus took odd jobs and applied to the magical colleges of various universities. Doing nothing with Sirius but dozing in parks and swanning around charity shops like young kings felt like another lifetime. He missed it something fierce. 

Eventually the day took them underneath the awning of a coffee shop, a few doors down from Harding’s flat. They’d extracted the object; it was a jade necklace that was supposedly an heirloom from an old money family. Just as Remus was about to make his way and apparate home, wand out and waiting in his calloused hand, Kingsley pressed a shy hand against his shoulder.

“Listen, Remus,” he said, eyes earnest, “you really should speak to Sirius.”

“I mean, I don’t know, Kingsley, I -”

“I mean it.” Kingsley smiled, and it was a sad thing to see on his face really, as they stood in the limbo of an alcove, and talked about  _ this,  _ whatever  _ this  _ is, in the middle of a war. “What you guys have is so  _ easy.  _ Do you know how difficult that is to find? I’ve been almost everywhere that there is to go, and I’ve never seen two people more in love. And you don’t even have to  _ try _ . You just have it.  _ Talk _ to him, Remus.”

“Fuck, Kingsley,” Remus stared at him, faintly aware of the sounds of the city around them, but zeroing in on nothing but the wand in his left hand, the jade necklace in his right, and the weight of the words in front of him. “Don’t just say shit like that, Jesus.” 

“Someone has to,” Kingsley patted him on the back. “Take care, mate.”

He apparated away. 

Remus stood under the awning, shellshocked. The city grew dim around him, something that owed less to where the sun hung at in the sky, and more to the faint whirrings that occupied Remus Lupin’s mind.

It had started to rain; something he only realised when the water started creeping in under the awning and seeping into his shoes. He soon came to his senses. His socks would be ruined if he stayed there any longer, and he had misplaced his darning wool the month he had moved out of Hogwarts. 

He took a deep breath, made like Kingsley, and apparated back to London. 

\--

Later, Remus found himself settled on the sofa in the living room, the jade necklace across from him on the coffee table. It was getting late, and Sirius had long since taken his leave to bed after gorging himself on chicken tikka masala. 

Being alone in Number Twelve was one thing in the early morning, but it was something else entirely in the night. 

The house that nestled itself in secrecy in Grimmauld Place was already riddled with unanswerable questions. Logistically, it made no sense. Stepping into the front door was like stepping into a soundless dead-spot. It was a vacuum; even though there were four walls and a roof, Remus always had the unnerving sense that the house itself merely displayed these features as a formality. 

And by the time dusk rolled around, the rooms seemed awful. It was difficult to describe. For lack of a vocabulary vast enough to express it: the dark...  _ ate  _ at the house. Even with the newly transfigured sofa, oppressive furniture littered every corner of every room and seemed to jeer at him when he passed their towering forms in the hallways. It took every ounce of courage in him not to give into his instinct to hold himself stock still. 

He was the only living and waking thing within its walls at that moment, but the fact that he had to actively remind himself of this meant it was not so much a comfort as it was a mantra. 

At a sensible thirty-four, Remus had never cared much for mantras. 

Now, he sat on the transfigured sofa, ignoring the pointed and patronising chairs that posed in various corners of the room (old twins of said sofa). There were an assortment of books that he had gathered over the years ambling about his knees, some with pages open and others with them dogeared. And ahead of him was, of course, the jade necklace. 

The gem itself was small: hooked and jagged like an overgrown tooth, and strung onto a chain of dull gold. To the unpracticed eye, it was innocuous, perhaps even plain. Remus missed the days when his eyes weren’t practiced in anything but aiming balled up parchment into the Common Room bin. 

Cursebreaking. For him, it was a labour of love. A stubborn strand of magic that involved numerous high-concentration tricky little charms and hexes, the combination of which were different in every individual case.

While rewarding, it was time consuming at best, and exhausting at worst. 

The jade necklace was proving especially difficult. More than anything else, he was growing moon-tired and desperate for a drink, hankering for something with whiskey. It wasn’t yet the full, not even close, but these days Remus’ nausea felt much like the ocean tide: it could shift to extremes within the twenty-four hour confines of day that a decade ago would have had him stumbling into the restricted wings of St Mungo’s.

He opened another book. 

\--

Remus’ patience was dwindling when Sirius entered the living room. 

He had descended the stairs silently; a feat of his that managed to make Remus jump out of his skin on almost the daily. Even though he had not passed through the front door in almost two decades, after hauling his sparse belongings into the stale house, every inch of peeling wallpaper and creaking floorboard had come back to him. As if through a dream, he had said at breakfast that first morning. He had slept on the mattress he had learned to hate as a child, and woke up with the ghost of that same child wandering aimlessly in the yawn of his adult body. 

“It’s late,” Sirius said now, looking from Remus to the mess spread out on the table. 

He was wearing a soft t-shirt and boxers, and was rubbing the sleep out of his eyes. His hair fell about him in waves. Remus recognised the shirt. It was his; something old and themed he had bought for a bar crawl, back when his liver was still, for the most part, agreeable. He had parted with some old clothes when Sirius reentered society, pinwheeling into his life with nothing but the grimy fabric that clung to his back.

“I’m working,” Remus replied, rubbing the back of his neck. 

“Aren’t you tired?” Sirius’ brow furrowed. 

Remus shrugged and repeated his words.

“I’m working.”

Though he loathed it, the monotony of Order work did seem to help him dull his senses.Trapped without an outlet, Sirius was not someone that he could bring himself to envy. Not these days.

“Listen,” Sirius paused. The stutter in his disjointed sentence suggested that he himself didn’t know what he was going to propose Remus listen to. “Just,” he paused again. “I can’t sleep,” he said finally.

Remus wasn’t sure why this was something that Sirius thought he could help with. 

“Am I being too loud?” This was a non-question. Remus had been almost as quiet as Sirius was when he had come down the stairs. The two of them both knew this.

“Come to bed,” Sirius tried again. 

“I’m sorry,” Remus said, guilty. “I’m almost finished.”

The bags under Sirius’ eyes were dark, and his expression pinched. He made little aborted movements for a few seconds, as if his body wanted to either tread further into the room or leave it entirely but his mind kept vetting the decision. 

Finally, he made his way past the acrid furniture and sat next to Remus on the sofa.

“It’s taking a long time?” he asked around a yawn as he settled.

“Yeah,” Remus replied distractedly, flicking between pages. “It’s very stubborn.”

“Hmmm,” Sirius moved closer and rested his head on Remus’ shoulder. Remus stilled minutely at the contact before forcing himself to relax. “Not unlike you, then.”

“You say the sweetest things.”

“That’s me,” he mumbled, voice low and flooded with sleep. “I’m a delight to be around. Just gonna sleep now, d’you mind?”

His breaths were steady and hot against Remus’ neck. It would be difficult to concentrate.

“Not at all,” he replied. Not at all. 

\--

The next morning, Remus stood in front of the kitchen sink, sipping his coffee and staring into the garden. 

It wasn’t a real garden. One of the Blacks had once upon a time charmed the windows with an impressive glamour, a trick which only flickered minutely at the edges. The not-garden was grand and arrogant, with flowers that still boasted colour in November, and an obtrusive fountain in Italian marble. 

Remus hated it. He had thought about dispelling the charm, but the illogical nature of Number Twelve reared its head before he had put any actual thought into it. If the space occupied by the house was merely a trick, what scene would this window naturally look out at? It wasn’t a question that Remus wanted answered.

Mostly Remus hated it because it reminded him of his parent’s house. It had only taken a minute of observing the fictitious sparrows diving on a loop before he was a kid again, lounging masterfully in the long meadow grasses of North Wales. 

Nobody from school had ever visited him when he was at home. This wasn’t something pitiful, it was just a fact. In the Summers they had all holidayed in James’ family home in Dorset, spent days licking ice creams on hot sands and nights drinking stolen wine on the patio. James’ parents only drank red, so they had to acclimate at fourteen and Sirius had thought them all suave young gods while Peter threw up behind Mrs Potter’s rose bushes. 

Remus had picked up smoking one winter at his parents’ house. He wasn’t allowed to spend Christmas anywhere else, and he didn’t particularly find himself wanting to, so it suited him just fine. 

In the evenings he had wandered off to The White Hart with some old muggle mates. Drank the cheapest ale on tap and edited his school stories for their consumption. The bartenders didn’t card him. He would’ve thanked the moon for his aged appearance, but they didn’t seem to be in the business of carding anyone at all. 

Gethin and Ioan didn’t exactly  _ know  _ him, but they’d all been in the same baby group and their mums met for a book club every first Wednesday of the month. They’d grown up thick as thieves, even  _ were  _ thieves on occasion, stealing apples from the local farmer’s orchard and running for their lives. Remus often wondered what they were doing now. 

It was one of these nights, crowded onto a shitty lichen-covered bench in the beer garden that Gethin had pulled out a bag of baccy and some papers. He’d shared his first fag with Ioan, passing to and from cold hands because Gethin had maintained he couldn’t afford to roll them one each, and he’d seemed so apologetic that Remus had known it was true. 

Later, after he and Ioan had dropped Gethin by his dad’s to sleep off his affinity for waxing poetic about Sid Vicious, they had stumbled into a field and shared another rollie that Ioan had snagged from Gethin’s wallet (he’d kept them pre-rolled, like an old man). This time, Ioan had pulled it directly from Remus’ mouth with a shaking but deliberate hand, and had brushed Remus’ parted lips with his thumb. 

In the days after, they would blame what had followed on the new buzz of nicotine and pints of bitter. But regardless, Remus would return to Hogwarts in the January of his sixth year, finally certain of what he had long suspected about himself but had shied away from facing head-on; that he was gay. 

The Black’s bewitched garden made him think of his childhood, hilly and lawless. But this version was twisted and dressed up for a ballroom that he’d never feel fit for. It was wilderness, on a leash but still untamed. It made him think unhappily of Sirius, a childhood spent in captivity. 

Sirius never smoked. Something about his pureblood lungs being the weak-willed product of unfortunate breeding. Of course, Remus had never pushed him on this. Although he would have thrilled at the sight of Sirius with a lit cigarette in his hands, he was grateful that he could keep some of his dignity. 

In the years after Hogwarts it would be him and James that would peel out into the patio at a house party, armed with a nifty wandless lumos and some straights that James would produce at the tip of a hat. It would be these moments, sitting on cold paving slabs with bottles knocking about their ankles, that Remus felt the weighty truth of James’ brotherhood. 

James had burned through cigarettes at a frightening pace in the early days of the war. There would always be something in the back of Remus that wished he had said something back then. Anything. He always felt like he could have done  _ more _ , those waning days when James was hurtling towards some terrifying balance between hot anger and resigned silence. 

He quit cold turkey when Harry was born, and saved the wandless lumos for Diwali. The anger was put aside for unwavering warmth. Remus had never known a better father.

In Number Twelve, Remus put his mug in the sink, stretched and glanced at his watch. It was still early, so he figured he had time to have a quick fag before Sirius came down. It wasn’t that Sirius didn’t like him smoking in the house, but he didn’t like to worry him; these days he only lit up when he was stressed. 

He mumbled a soft lumos into the crook of his palm where his cigarette was cradled, and nudged open the window. Once the illusion was shattered he could see that beyond the walls of Number Twelve there was nothing but a thick white. The absence of anything, a space devoid of shadow or matter. Colourless and hollow. He frowned, unnerved, and turned around, facing the hallway, just in time to see Sirius come into the kitchen. 

“You ashing that into the sink?” 

“Yeah,” Remus said, as he did just that. “You’re up early.”

“The sofa’s kind of uncomfortable after spending a whole night on it,” he put the kettle on, glancing over to Remus. 

“Already had a coffee, ta.”

Sirius hummed. 

“Sorry about leaving you on the sofa, you just…”

Sirius turned towards him in question at his pause, scratching absentmindedly at his jaw where his stubble hadn’t been shaved for a few days. 

“Well,” he tried to articulate himself. “You haven’t been sleeping recently and it felt cruel to wake you.”

“Yeah, I guess,” he paused. “It’s been…  _ colder,  _ than I’ve been used to for a long time. The walls in this house are so thin. At night it sometimes feels like I’m still in fucking Azkaban,” he shook himself and sent a wry grin in Remus’ direction. “You were nice to rest on though. Like my own space heater or something.”

Remus took a long drag. 

“I would have stayed,” he said regretfully, through the smoke, “but I already have the body of an eighty year old.”

“Maybe it’s asking you to actually come to bed at a normal time then, Moons.”

Remus paused, cigarette half to his lips. 

“What like,  _ your  _ bed?”

Sirius had turned so that he was resolutely facing the kettle.

“Yeah. My mattress is better than yours, and you would be warm, and... Well. Would you be… okay with that?”

“Of course,” Remus’ voice felt fragile to his own ears, logged with honey. “More than.”

Sirius' mouth quirked.

“Good,” he said, and made his way out of the kitchen with his coffee in hand calling back over his shoulder. “And put that out. You’re not allowed to be so hot this early in the morning.”

“I can’t help it!” He called back weakly. “I can’t just turn off my charm!”

Sirius’ laughter travelled all the way through the belly of the house. It was like lighting a match in a tower made of sticks. 

\--

In the afternoon, Remus wrote an Owl to Kingsley. He told himself it was just a general check up on a friend, but the reality was that Kingsley having a date was the most excitingly normal thing that had happened among any of them for years. 

_ Royal,  _

_ Hope you got home okay last night. After you left me in the rain I was too stuck in my own head to remember that you had quite a journey ahead of you. Still, I think you deserve it for all but jilting me outside a coffee shop. It’s the bus stop in Nova Scotia all over again! Though I guess if I’m bringing up Canada then we  _ must  _ be even.  _

_ Thanks for talking some sense into me. I appreciate it. I know how I get, sometimes. Like pulling teeth, my mum used to say.  _

_ That being said, this letter has really just been a prelude for me asking the real shit. How did your date go last night? Were they nice? I know, I know, I’m being exceptionally nosy. But can you blame me? I haven’t known anyone that’s been on a date in the last ten fucking years. Please give me all the details. But not  _ all  _ the details. You know what I mean. Say hi to the cat for me.  _

_ Romulus. _

Sirius noticed that he was writing a letter half way through, and sat next to him at the dining table.

“How’re you planning to send that, then?”

“What d’you mean?” He replied, distractedly checking over what he’d written. 

“We don’t have an owl, Moony.”

“Oh. Shit.”

“You could use Floo?”

“Would that work?” 

“I reckon so.”

Remus sighed.

“It does make you feel a bit shit, doesn’t it?” Sirius pondered. “That we just have to sit around and wait for people to come to  _ us.  _ Dumbledore’s taken all my agency. I feel like a heroine in an Austen novel.”

“I’m not sure that’s an entirely accurate comparison.”

“True,” he conceded. “At least Elizabeth Bennet can go on walks.”

Remus hummed, kicking at his legs absentmindedly under the table. 

“What are you writing to him about, anyway?”

“He had a date last night, I’m asking him how it went. Do you want to add anything?” He asked, handing the letter across the table and resting his cheek in his palm. Sirius’ eyes flicked over the paper, and the tilt of his face emphasised his eyelashes and the subtle curve of his nose. 

“You look good,” Remus commented, before he could stop himself.

An easy smile broke out on Sirius’ face.

“Oh yeah?” He grinned, not looking up. “Why’s that then?”

“I dunno. You just look, I dunno. Pretty, I guess. Shut up. Prick.”

“Pretty, you  _ guess.  _ Such kind words, I’m going to swoon,” he handed back the letter, smiling. “Nothing to add, I don’t think. But I  _ have  _ to know what happened in Canada. One pretty boy to another.”

“Hey, I never called you a pretty boy _._ ”

“Well, I’m calling  _ you  _ a pretty boy, so get used to it.”

“Sirius, I’m thirty-four years old,” he replied, exasperated.

“Yeah,  _ and?  _ Beauty has no expiry date”

“Jesus Christ. Do you want to hear about Canada or not?”

“Have I told you how ruggedly handsome you look today?”

“Oh my god. Shut the fuck up.” He leaned back in his chair. “So, it’s 1985, and I’m doing some odd jobs in Glasgow, when Dumbledore, tit that he is, hears about a pack of wolves in Halifax…” 

\--

Getting ready for bed was a quiet affair. Remus dragged his clothes from his room and piled them onto a chair which is perched in front of the window. Sirius rolled his eyes when he saw the heap, and his annoyance made Remus smile. 

Remus had never been in Sirius’ room for longer than a minute, before. It still looks like how he must have had it as a teenager; garish Gryffindor banners are tied between the bed’s four posts, and the walls are slathered in muggle pin ups and motorbike magazine covers. Sirius catches him raising an eyebrow at a couple of the photos and quirks a grin. 

“Permanent sticking charm.” 

“Not really your taste, I thought.”

Sirius laughed.

“I’m flattered that you’d think I’d have the balls to introduce my parents to Playgirl. I just wanted to annoy them, not provoke them into _ actually killing me, _ ” he paused and his smile softens slightly as he avoids Remus’ gaze. “Besides. Hadn’t quite figured it all out myself, at that point.”

“No, I mean. Me too.”

“Thought you’d had yourself decided in the middle of Hogwarts?”

“Well, yeah. I meant ‘me too’ to the bit about your parents. Even bloodtraiters have to draw the line somewhere.”

“Right,” he grinned quietly. “God, the world is shit, isn’t it?”

“It’s getting better,” Remus sat on the edge of Sirius’ bed, clad in a soft sleep shirt and boxers. “It’s always getting better.”

Sirius hummed in agreement before stretching until every bone in his back cracked. He cast a silent and wandless  _ nox  _ before crawling under the covers. Remus took the prompt and pulled back the duvet on his side and slipped in. 

“I know it is.” The suddenness of Sirius’ voice sounds low in the dark, “but to be honest, I’m getting tired of waiting around for it to catch up.”

He rolled over so that he was facing away from Remus, the silhouette of his shoulders hard to make out in the night. 

Unsure of what to say, Remus carefully reached for his shoulder and squeezed it. Sirius sighed so quietly that Remus could only tell from the soft movement under his palm, and reached up to take Remus’ hand in his. Both their hands were calloused, but Remus found comfort in that; that they were the only rough thing to touch that either of their skin would come into contact with in this bed of overly soft Egyptian Cotton. 

Sleep came easy after that. 

\--

The next morning, Remus of course woke before Sirius. He left Sirius dozing in bed, hair tangled about him on the pillow, to drag himself to the kitchen. 

In the orange morning light he made himself a coffee, and reached for the earl grey to make a mug for Sirius. He made quick work of it before pulling himself back up the stairs, the two mugs steaming in his hands. They were both a mottled grey, aging remnants of a flat he’d long since left. 

When he pushed open the bedroom door with his hip, he was greeted by Sirius sitting up with a book in his lap. There was a letter still sealed on the pillow that Remus had used the previous night. 

At the sound of the door opening, he looked up from the book.

“That for me?” he asked, making grabby hands at the mug of tea as Remus was putting his coffee down on the bedside table. “Gimme.”

Remus obliged with a roll of his eyes.

“And a very good morning to you, twat.”

Sirius ignored him, pulling back his side of the duvet instead. 

“Get back in here,” he said. “Letter came for you.”

“From Kingsley?” Remus asked, getting in and pulling the covers up around his middle. “It didn’t try the downstairs windows.”

“Yeah, because it’s an incredibly intelligent owl and it decided that I’m the man of the house.”

“You are so full of shit,” Remus snorted. “Did you sleep well last night?”

“Yeah. Thanks.”

“Of course,” Remus replied, opening the letter.

_ Romulus,  _

_ It was good to see you again. I hope you took what I said seriously. I expect wedding invitations before this is all over. Or at least, an invitation to a party with both your names at the bottom. Let's say it’ll be a Victory Party, and play at optimism.  _

_ The date when well! He’s a muggle, and he works in engineering. I know you said you want all the details, but allow me to just thank your mum that I don’t have to waste time explaining what an engineer does. He was very nice. And normal! He asked me what I do for work and I had to say that I was in sales. Fuck, I wish I  _ was  _ in sales. I took him out for drinks and we’re getting coffee next weekend.  _

_ I mean this with love, but I think you need to get over Canada. Also, nothing is stopping you from having a little date in that dingy house of yours. Just a reminder.  _

_ Desperately awaiting that party invitation,  _

_ Royal.  _

“What’s he saying?” Sirius asked behind his mug. He had dogeared his book and tossed it to the foot of the bed. Something by James Baldwin, by the look of the cover. 

“Not much,” Remus replied, handing the letter to him. “Just answering all my invasive questions about his date, really.”

“Ah, you  _ are  _ a nosy git, aren’t you.” 

“I will throw your tea out the window.”

Sirius rolled his eyes. 

“Idiot,” he said. And then: “What’s he mean about having a date at home?”

“Hm?” Remus stalled, embarrassed, trying to think of something to say in the little portion of time he’d bought. 

“Just here,” Sirius elaborated, leaning towards him and pointing out the words on the page. “He expects wedding invitations. You meeting up with a gentleman friend on the sly, Moony?”

“No,” he fumbled. “Don’t be stupid.” 

“Not really a stupid question, Remus.” His voice grew thin, abruptly. “Why does Kingsley know about this before me? I mean, I love him dearly and all, but I thought I was your first port of call with this sort of thing.”

“What do you mean, ‘this sort of thing?’” Remus could feel the conversation derailing, but he couldn’t seem to bring himself to pull it back on track. 

“You know. Romance. The birds and the bees. Did you ever  _ get  _ the talk?” His voice was tight and Remus could feel him slipping out of reason. He was getting out of bed and stalking towards his wardrobe, the line of his body strung out and tense. 

“Hey Sirius, wait. Listen, let me explain at least.”

“Could you,” he paused and the silence in the room was agonising. “Could you leave? I don’t want to say anything, I don’t know. That I don’t mean.”

“Sure,” Remus said shortly. “I don’t want to  _ force  _ you into anything you _ can’t help saying _ .”

“Please. Don’t you have… I don’t know. An  _ interview  _ or something? Or are we still pretending those ones the other day went well”

Remus stared at Sirius’ back.

“That was out of line and you know it,” he said, his voice low.

He took his coffee and left. 

\--

It is not easy living in a house when the only other occupant is the man you have been in love with for over half your life, and said occupant is also directing all their ice cold contempt at you through passive aggressive post-it notes and stealing the cushions from the only sofa in the entire godforsaken building. 

He only sends a simple letter back to Kingsley, just a simple:

_ Fuck’s sake. He thinks I want to elope with some mysterious man, now. _

And in return, he gets a:

_ It is incredible that you let him read your post and he still doesn't think that he is the one you want to marry.  _

He is grateful at least that he had one good night of sleep before it all went to shit. 

His routine is now much the same as it has been, but with an undercurrent of misery that he hasn’t felt since before Sirius had hurricaned back into his life. 

Wake up early and alone. Make coffee and stare out the window. Wait around aimlessly for letters to give him a direction. Time his visits to the kitchen to avoid Sirius. Cook meals and leave a portion for Sirius. Lay awake at night wondering if Sirius is sleeping as badly if he is. Go downstairs and make chamomile tea. Wonder if he should bring a mug up to Sirius. Remember they’re arguing. Try to relax into the sofa. Realise how uncomfortable it is without all the cushions that Sirius has slowly pilfered for his pity party of a four-poster bed. Try to do work. Start falling asleep by two am. Go back upstairs. Sleep fitfully until seven and then repeat. 

Grimmauld Place was draining him. 

It was a middling sort of afternoon. The light was hollow and warped, painting the living room in warmer colours than it should be able to sustain. He tried not to think about the way the sun made its way through the house. Just like everything else, it made no sense. 

He had a letter from Dumbledore, which was sat before him on the table. He hasn’t opened it yet. He doesn’t want to be sent on yet another mission which doesn’t take into account the difficulty of the work, or the reality of his weakening body’s durability. Surely Dumbledore has some spare galleons knocking around somewhere that he could spare in return for whatever he’s asking for. 

He could always look for jobs, he ponders, head in his hands. Sirius did have a point, after all. Sure, he thought blows that low were something of the past, reserved for angry teenagers without an outlet, but beggars can’t be choosers. Sirius had been locked up in the childhood home he hated for months now. In retrospect, some kind of lashing out was to be expected. Though thinking like that about Sirius made him feel guilty. He shouldn’t have assumed this shit could be fine and dandy forever. He couldn’t predict Sirius’ every move while keeping him content by plying him with his favourite tea, for fuck’s sake.

God, he was too tired for this shit, and it was barely three p.m. 

He should just open the envelope. Surely he should just open the envelope? 

He leaned back into the sofa. 

He debated placing the unopened envelope somewhere Sirius would find it. He always had a few choice words to say about Dumbledore, and Remus felt that they would do something to raise his spirits. Even if they were low  _ because  _ of him, Sirius always knew what he needed to hear. 

Sirius was upstairs somewhere. In his bedroom, Remus assumed. He had started coming downstairs less, since the other morning. It was worrying, sure, but Remus wasn’t certain he was welcome in there anymore. He’d always been someone who waited for people to come to him, uncertain whether he would be greeted with open arms. Even with Sirius. Especially with Sirius, even, though he wished he wasn’t. 

Except, no. That wasn’t right. Sirius wasn’t upstairs. He was looking right at him. It was a heavy gaze, somehow remaining both guarded and curious, and holding the weight of it made Remus feel as if his legs were bowing under him, a symptom of carrying a trophy that he had not yet won. He found himself once again absently considering whether he would ever get used to feeling worthy of having someone like Sirius looking at him. He wasn’t sure. Was he now of an age where he was considered an ‘old dog’, or would the right man be able to teach him new tricks? He wasn’t sure he liked the comparison, whatever the conclusion. 

  
  


“Aren’t you going to let me in?” Sirius said, finally. To someone who didn’t know him, he would have sounded artfully confident; the unfortunate prince to the walls the two men found themselves trapped in. Remus was not someone who didn’t know him. 

“I wasn’t aware that I was the one who could do the letting in.” He let himself meet Sirius’ eyes. He looked tired. In some ways, it was like looking in a mirror. In most ways, it was not.

Sirius gestured widely, wildy. 

“Your domain,” he surmised. “Your sofa,” he clarified. 

“You want to sit?” Remus shifted to the right, making space on the transfigured creature. Sometimes it was like they were one being, two-headed, four-legged. It was relieving to know he could still predict the motions of the other. It was like breathing. Or, not quite. Breathing required effort if you thought about it too hard. It was more like beating your heart. Instinctual. Necessary. If one of them forgot to pump the muscle, they would both die. 

“Thanks,” he said. He lowered himself to the sofa like it pained him. 

They sat facing forward for a long minute. 

“I’ve been beastly,” Sirius said abruptly, ending the silence. “Really, I have. Like Padfoot. Pissing all over the good things.”

It seemed like it had hurt Sirius to let the words out of his mouth, so he let him sit with them in the air for a gratifying and endless thirty seconds. He  _ had  _ been beastly, but Remus wasn’t going to be crueler to him than making him stew in his own confession. 

“Am I supposed to be a ‘good thing?’”

Sirius sank into the pitiful sofa, embarrassed but earnest. Possibly he was trying to drown himself. Remus vaguely wondered how he thought that would be possible when all its cushions were miles upstairs, hidden spitefully in Sirius’ bedroom. 

“Yes. The good-est,” he corrected himself. “The  _ best _ . The best of the best. I was cruel and awful and evil. It’s okay if you do have a gentleman friend. We are all entitled to love in this unfeeling world. Especially you. You more than… more than any of us.” 

Remus wasn’t sure who this ‘us’ was, but he knew what he was getting at. Remus traipsed through life like it was an unending sequence of hotel rooms. He had trouble making people and sentimental objects stick. Sirius had been a magnet at Hogwarts, as had James. They’d been raised in a way that meant that when they entered a room, it would always be the most exciting thing the room had seen all day. It didn’t matter whether the brand of exciting was electric or draining, they couldn’t turn it off. 

In summary, Remus had never turned heads. He had grown up running with a pack of boys who did. Sirius had assumed that this had left an envious residue in Remus’ psyche. Remus thought he better put him out of his misery. 

“I don’t have a gentleman friend.”

“Thank God,” came the reply. He sunk further still into the sofa, and Remus wasn’t sure he wasn’t trying to get some of the long-cold transfiguration magic to rub off on him and send him hurtling to the centre of the sorry looking piece of furniture. 

He took a moment to consider him. The royal slope of his nose. His lovely neck. The stubble gracing his jaw, bringing him back to the land of the mortal. His eyelashes. The bags under his eyes. His handsome features. His humanness. The well inside him that could be filled with cruelty. The quietly blooming compassion that filled it instead. 

“He has nothing to do with it,” he responded, late. 

Sirius quirked an eye open. Somehow Remus hadn’t been quite aware it had been shut. Somehow he found Sirius’ careful hand in his, without fully understanding who had first bridged the narrow cavern between them. 

“I’m sorry,” Sirius murmured, ashamed, voicing what they had both known the moment after he had opened his mouth in the first place, that drowsy morning with the windows open. 

“I know,” Remus allowed. “Me too.”

Something shifted in Sirius’ eyes, and he sidestepped the conversation, hitchhiking his way towards the next one with some purpose. 

“I know about the other thing, too.”

“The other thing?” Remus had opened his mouth to ask, but he had already been cut off. 

Sirius had kissed him. 

When he was a teenager,  _ newly  _ a teenager, thirteen or fourteen, he had grappled with the fact that he had been sorted into Gryffindor almost nightly. It had seemed like some cruel cosmic joke to him, that his life had already contained enough plot twists before he had hit puberty that he alone could have comfortably housed one of his mother’s English tv soaps. It felt like fate was goading him when it had diagnosed him with the incurable problem of being courageous, told him to stick it out with a bunch of rowdy and extroverted types, and called it a day.

He had never considered himself brave. He was not brave when he cried in his thin-walled bedroom as a child, listening to his father’s unwavering hatred being broadcasted through rants to his mother in the living room. He was not brave when he was paralysed with hollow fear each endless night that the full moon rose. He was not brave when he had let the others find out about the wolf without telling them directly but instead leaving clumsy clues. He was not brave when he had let the others find out he liked boys by leaving the Common Room with Dearborn, purposefully allowing a hand in his back pocket. 

Remus didn’t think himself brave. He thought of himself as hardy, enduring; a stone lodged in the bottom of a riverbed which refused to be taken with the current. He was stubborn. Difficult. A miracle that had grown out of his endless capacity to put his foot down. 

Sirius was kissing him. Remus was kissing him back.

One day he had woken up from a dream in which he was not in love with Sirius Black, and had looked towards the rest of his life with resigned acceptance. Everything was split into this before and after. In this idealised past, he was wandering through the hallways of Hogwarts, worrying about mundane things, staying up inadvisably late in the library until he was thrown out. His waking thoughts were occupied by something that wasn’t Sirius Black. Homework, maybe. His future, possibly. Things he couldn’t change about himself but he desperately wished he could, probably. Most likely. His sleeping thoughts were occupied by nightmares.

After the realisation, he still continued to do all these things. But somewhere, in the back of his mind, was Sirius. He would be wandering through the hallways of Hogwarts, but would be unable to shake the heavy feeling against his chest that was inescapable when he was walking next to him. He would stay late in the library but he would be glancing intermittently at the sloped face that caught the candlelight graciously beside him. Sirius didn’t need to study, he was one of those annoying people who seemed to absorb information like a sponge that refused to concentrate. This had made it all the more trying for Remus’ robin-like heart when he’d agree to spend his evenings surrounded by dusty tomes and kicking at Remus’ heels. His waking thoughts were occupied by Sirius Black. His sleeping thoughts were occupied by nightmares where he was a wolf and he mauled Sirius Black.

He had had an entire lifetime to explain this to Sirius. He had had years to find the language, to find his mettle.

He had never let himself be brave. Sirius’ chest was warm under his fingers. He had slipped his hands up under his jumper without even thinking about it. 

Remus was kissing him. Sirius was kissing him back.

He felt brave now. 

  
  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> thank u for reading! i'm luckycharmr on tumblr :) kudos and comments are loved as always. i appreciate you! have a nice day.


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